Acoustic Kitty was CIA cat with mission to bug Kremlin By Cameron Simpson The Herald, Nov 5th, 2001 IT was the purrfect plan to uncover the Kremlin's deepest secrets - by turning cats into walking bugging devices. While James Bond had to cross claws with Pussy Galore in the cat-suited form of Honor Blackman, the CIA hoped the Soviets would meet their match in the 1960s at the paws of Acoustic Kitty. Recently declassified documents show that in one experiment during the Cold War Acoustic Kitty was being wired up for use as an eavesdropping platform. It was hoped that the animal - which went under the surgeon's knife to accommodate transmitting and control devices - could listen to secret conversations from window sills, park benches or dustbins in Moscow. According to Victor Marchetti, a former CIA officer, Acoustic Kitty was a creation of Frankenstein proportions - albeit a lot smaller. He said: "They slit the cat open, put batteries in him, wired him up. "The tail was used as an antenna. They made a monstrosity. "They tested him and tested him. They found he would walk off the job when he got hungry, so they put another wire in to override that." Stuart Crawford, a defence consultant with insider knowledge of security and espionage, said there were lots of examples of animals being used in warfare. One of the earliest examples was Samson who set fire to the tails of 300 foxes and let them go in the corn fields of his enemies. The early Greeks also made good use of a wooden horse. Mr Crawford, a former lieutenant colonel with the Royal Tank Regiment, said the Russians had used dogs in the second world war to carry mines under German tanks. He said: "They fed the dogs under tanks with the engines running. They then ran under the German tanks thinking they would get food there. "The Special Operations Executive put explosives into dead rats and smuggled them into France where they were scattered in the boilerhouses of major industrial installations. A watchman would throw them in the boiler and it would blow them to smithereens." However, Acoustic Kitty did not go with the same bang and sadly for the CIA did not turn out to have nine lives. Mr Marchetti said that the first live trial - the technology for which is thought to have set the CIA back more than £10m - was a costly disaster. He said: "They took it out to a park and put him out of the van, and a taxi comes and runs him over. There they were, sitting in the van with all those dials, and the cat was dead." A senior fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington said: "I'm not sure for how long after the operation the cat would have survived even if it hadn't been run over." In 1966, the same year as Acoustic Kitty was tested, a British film called Spy With a Cold Nose featured a dog wired up to eavesdrop on the Russians. Mr Crawford said the Acoustic Kitty scenario also sounded "a bit James Bondish". He added: "I don't think that even the wildest imaginations in the British secret service would go down the route of turning cats into walking bugging devices. It's so off the wall." The Acoustic Kitty document - one of 40 to be declassified from the CIA's science and technology directorate, where spying techniques are refined, is still partly censored. It suggests that the CIA was embarrassed about disclosing all the details of the project, which took five years to design. However, a memo congratulates the Acoustic Kitty team for their hard work.

CIA put transmitter in cat and used tail as antenna to get Kremlin secrets Ananova, Nov 4th, 2001 The CIA tried to discover Russia's Cold War secrets by installing bugging devices in a cat and using its tail as an antenna. Recently declassified documents show agents inserted the transmitters into the cat they called Acoustic Kitty. A former officer says the experiment - carried out in 1966 - ended when the cat was run over. They hoped the cat would allow them to listen to secret conversations from window sills and park benches. Victor Marchetti told The Sunday Telegraph: "They slit the cat open, put batteries in him, wired him up. The tail was used as an antenna. They made a monstrosity. They tested him and tested him. They found he would walk off the job when he got hungry, so they put another wire in to override that." He adds: "They took it out to a park and put him out of the van, and a taxi comes and runs him over. There they were, sitting in the van with all those dials, and the cat was dead." The document has been declassified from the Science and Technology Directorate.

CIA's 'spy cat' goes splat By James Morrison Independent Digital (UK) Ltd, Nov 4th, 2001 It should have been the perfect spy. But the CIA's attempt to use a surgically altered cat as a covert bugging device fell at the first hurdle – when it was run over by a taxi. Nicknamed "Acoustic Kitty", the audacious scheme was one of a number of bizarre projects dreamt up by military scientists in the latter days of the Cold War, according to documents newly released by the US National Security Archive. A domestic cat was wired up with control and transmission equipment designed to turn it into a mobile "eavesdropper" capable of listening in on conversations by using its tail as an antenna. In an account related in a new book by US intelligence historian Dr Jeffrey Richelson, a former CIA agent explains that the experiment was not an unqualified success. Victor Marchetti, an ex-officer with the agency, recalls: "They slit the cat open, put batteries in him, wired him up. The tail was used as an antenna. They made a monstrosity. They tested and tested him. They found he would walk off the job when he got hungry, so they put another wire in to override that. "Finally, they're ready. They took it to a park and said, 'listen to those two guys. Don't listen to anyone else – not the birds, not cat or the dog – just those two guys!' "Then they put him out of the van, and a taxi comes and runs him over!" Marchetti's testimony is one of several relating to the failed experiment quoted in Dr Richelson's book, The Wizards of Langley: The CIA's Directorate of Science and Technology. "Acoustic Kitty" was by no means the biggest failure in the annals of CIA espionage. Others chronicle the use of mind control drugs that led to the suicide of an Army scientist, and futile attempts to use poison pens and exploding seashells to assassinate Cuban leader Fidel Castro.

CIA recruited cat to bug Russians By Charlotte Edwardes Telegraph, Nov 4th, 2001 THE CIA tried to uncover the Kremlin's deepest secrets during the 1960s by turning cats into walking bugging devices, recently declassified documents show. In one experiment during the Cold War a cat, dubbed Acoustic Kitty, was wired up for use as an eavesdropping platform. It was hoped that the animal - which was surgically altered to accommodate transmitting and control devices - could listen to secret conversations from window sills, park benches or dustbins. Victor Marchetti, a former CIA officer, told The Telegraph that Project Acoustic Kitty was a gruesome creation. He said: "They slit the cat open, put batteries in him, wired him up. The tail was used as an antenna. They made a monstrosity. They tested him and tested him. They found he would walk off the job when he got hungry, so they put another wire in to override that." Mr Marchetti said that the first live trial was an expensive disaster. The technology is thought to have cost more than L10 million. He said: "They took it out to a park and put him out of the van, and a taxi comes and runs him over. There they were, sitting in the van with all those dials, and the cat was dead." The document, which was one of 40 to be declassified from the CIA's closely guarded Science and Technology Directorate - where spying techniques are refined - is still partly censored. This implies that the CIA was embarrassed about disclosing all the details of Acoustic Kitty, which took five years to design. Dr Richelson, who is the a senior fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington, said of the document: "I'm not sure for how long after the operation the cat would have survived even if it hadn't been run over." The memo ends by congratulating the team who worked on the Acoustic Kitty project for its hard work. It says: "The work done on this problem over the years reflects great credit on the personnel who guided it . . . whose energy and imagination could be models for scientific pioneers." By coincidence, in 1966, a British film called Spy With a Cold Nose featured a dog wired up to eavesdrop on the Russians. It was the same year as the Acoustic Kitty was tested.

CIA's pet project for a purrfect spy fails From Roland Watson in Washington The Times, Nov 5th, 2001 THE CIA ignored the actors’ watchword never to work with animals when it tried to turn cats into Cold War spies in the 1960s — with pitiful results. In one experiment, a cat was fitted with listening devices and a control system, requiring extensive and repeated surgery. The idea of Project “Acoustic Kitty” was for the hapless animal to sidle up to Soviet bloc spies, perch on nearby park benches or window sills, and allow its CIA masters to listen in. The five-year project involved repeated operations on the cat to refine the technology to ensure that it went where its spymasters required. But while the idea may have looked flawless on paper, if extremely painful for the cat, it proved a hopeless failure in practice. The cat was run over by a taxi as it made its way towards its first assignment and the project was abandoned. The details are contained in recently declassified documents from the CIA’s Science and Technology Directorate relating to American operations at the height of the Cold War. They confirm what had sounded like far-fetched claims made by Victor Marchetti, a former CIA agent who is now a vehement critic of the agency. Mr Marchetti said that the treatment of the cat in the name of espionage was merciless. “They slit the cat open, put batteries in him, wired him up. The tail was used as an antenna. They made him a monstrosity.” The official conclusions provide more sober reading. A memorandum attached to the released records stated: “The programme would not lend itself in a practical sense to our highly specialised needs. The environmental and security factors in using this technique in a real foreign situation force us to conclude that, for our purposes, it would not be practical.”